ECF Game 3 Review

Yesterday afternoon the New York Rangers defeated the New Jersey Devils 3-0 and took a 2-1 series lead in the Eastern Conference Finals.

1) Man, Henrik Lundqvist is some goalie, eh? How about those two saves on Ilya Kovalchuk? He was stellar all game. He was tracking the puck well, and the defense did a good job keeping the lane free from those deflections that plagued the team in Game 2.

2) The Rangers first goal was a direct result of Pete DeBoer not using his time-out after having a tired group trapped on the ice after an icing. Salvador was trapped on the ice, couldn’t move his feet, and took a hooking penalty on Gaborik. Then, Richards won a draw cleanly, and Girardi fired a shot past Brodeur for his 3rd goal (all GWGs) of the playoffs.

2) The second goal all started with a great shift by John Mitchell. The puck was cleared out of the zone, and Mitchell, instead of dumping the puck deep, carried the puck and held it until reinforcements arrived. He cycled the puck to Callahan, who took a shot, a second chance by Callahan deflected off Salvador, past Kovalchuk, to the point where McDonagh’s shot was deflected by Kreider making in 2-0.

3) Hopefully those three will be teaming up on goals for quite a while.

4) Another game, another PPG. Every game in the series has featured a PPG by the Rangers against a Devils penalty kill that was top 5 all season long.

5) The empty net goal was a great effort by both Boyle and Callahan. Boyle hit the red line, and angled a shot toward the net and it went just wide. Callahan was speeding after it, beat the Devils player to it and scored from about 1 foot off the icing line at a crazy angle.

6) Even though they won, I thought the Rangers played dreadfully the first period and a half. The first period had maybe one shift that the Rangers dominated. Midway through the second, John Tortorella had seen enough and used his timeout. He laid into his team and they seemed to respond, as they always do, to the coach.

7) DeBoer calling Prust a headhunter, that’s a bit extreme. I’ve been watching Prust since he’s been traded here, and this is the first time I’ve seen him do anything borderline dirty.

8) I thought Torts did a good job protecting Prust today. Basically saying if we want to talk about hits Zubrius had an elbow on Stralman and that the Devils set picks to allow Kovalchuk open chances at the net.

9) I fully expect the Devils to come back and play just as good as they did last night. I think the series will probably head back to New York tied at 2.

Devils at Rangers: Game 2

Tonight, the Rangers take on the Devils in game number two of the best of seven series. The Rangers lead the series 1-0.

Leading Scorers
NJD- Ilya Kovalchuk
NYR- Brad Richards

Starting Goalies
NJD- Martin Brodeur
NYR- Henrik Lundqvist

Prediction
The Rangers come out with another strong effort and best the Devils 2-1.

ECF Game 1 Review

Last night the Rangers defeated the Devils 3-0 to take a 1-0 lead in the ECF.

1) Some people may have thought the first two periods of the game were a snoozefest, but that’s normally how it goes in game 1. Both teams are feeling each other out. I thought the Rangers looked good for having just 1 day off compared to the 5 days the Devils had.

2) That Ryan McDonagh guy is pretty good, huh? I’m not sure there are many players in the league who could have caught up to Parise and knocked him off the puck like that or forced Kovalchuk to take a weak backhand instead of being able to cut to the net.

3) Dan Girardi had a pretty strong game. Except for that gaffe that almost allowed Zubrius to tuck the puck in past Lundqvist.

4) On that first goal, a couple lucky bounces for the Rangers. First, Del Zotto looks to go off the glass and it hits a divider and comes off at an odd angle. Then, the puck hops over the stick of Salvador and Kreider was off to the races. He got the puck and fed a slow, flat puck right to Dan Girardi, who had come off the bench to replace Del Zotto, and he fired a puck past the blocker of Brodeur.

5) Kreider and Girardi weren’t done just yet. At the end of a powerplay, Girardi went to pass the puck cross ice in the Rangers zone and Kreider wasn’t expecting it, so he kicked the puck to Del Zotto, who fired it back to Girardi. He made a great pass to Anisimov, who caught it, crossed the blue line and laid it over to Kreider who stepped in and scored a goal fairly similar to his game 1 goal against the Caps.

6) I thought Brodeur had a okay game. Aside from Brodeur’s huge glove save on Staal, I didn’t think he was that spectacular. He had a few bad giveaways handling the puck, which is supposed to be his strong suit. We’ll have to see if that’s a trend going forward, which would be a huge break for the Rangers.

7) What can you say about Henrik Lundqvist that hasn’t already been said? The best goalie in the world. His back-to-back-to-back saves on Parise were fantastic. The glove save on Henrique, as well as pushing Zubrius’ shot over the net. Great goaltending.

8) I thought the Gaborik-Richards-Hagelin line was good for the Rangers. They all were working the puck well and generated a few scoring chances along the way.

9) A final note. Has anyone else noticed the coverage on NBCSN has been terrible? The replays are terrible, the play by play call is inaccurate, the intermission reports are intolerable. C’mon NBC.

Lundqvist Named 3rd Star

Henrik Lundqvist was named the third star of the week for the NHL after posting a ridiculous .032 GAA and a .987 SV% in three games going 2-0-1. He had two shutouts, against Boston and Florida and gave up one lone goal to Ottawa.

You can tell that Hank is really stepping up to the plate and putting the team on his back on the way to the playoffs. Here’s the official statement from the NHL:

Lundqvist posted a 2-0-1 record, 0.32 goals-against average, .987 save percentage and two shutouts as the Rangers (41-30-5) moved closer to securing an Eastern Conference playoff berth by earning five of a possible six points. Lundqvist stopped 77 of 78 shots, beginning with a 22-save performance in a 1-0 victory over the Florida Panthers Mar. 22. He recorded 29 saves in a 2-1 shootout loss to the Ottawa Senators Mar. 24 and finished the week by making 26 saves in recording his League-leading 11th shutout of the season, a 1-0 victory over the Boston Bruins Mar. 26. Lundqvist improved to 33-24-5 on the season with a 2.24 goals-against average and .924 save percentage. He has extended his NHL record by posting 30+ wins for the sixth consecutive season to start his career.

Rangers Dismantle Leafs

Tonight’s game can be summed up in two words: Marian. Gaborik. The Slovakian sniper absolutely stole the show for the Blueshirts tonight.

The Rangers found out prior to the game they would be without leading scorer Brandon Dubinsky. Enter Marian Gaborik.

After being benched in the final periods of Sundays game against the Flyers, Gaborik responded in a big way potting 4 goals and adding a helper against a clearly overmatched Leafs team.

Ruslan Fedotenko also scored a goal before being injued and not returning to the game. This is just more bad news for the Rangers who have been decimated by injuries.

Boyle and Zuccarello also tallied for the Blueshirts. Henrik Lundqvist made 22 saves for his 7th shutout of the year and 31st of his career.

The Rangers now move into sole possession of 6th place in the East, just one point behind the Capitals.

The Rangers play again tomorrow night against the Hurricanes in another important game for the Rangers. If they can get 8 out of 10 points, including tonight’s game and the next four, they will be sitting pretty prior to the All Star Game.

Rangers Shut Out League Leading Canucks

In one of the best hockey games I’ve ever watched, the Rangers, led by Henrik Lundqvist, shutout the number one team in the NHL.

Newly acquired Wojtek Wolski scored the lone goal for the Rangers on the powerplay after Gaborik took the puck to the net, the puck was lying in the crease and Wolski slapped it into the net.

Henrik Lundqvist was simply phenomenal. He stopped deflections, redirections, rebounds, odd man rushes, powerplay chances. He was superb stopping all 31 shots that the Canucks threw at him. It was truly one of his best performances.

The Rangers are in a tie for 5th place with Washington and are just 4 points out of first place in the East.

The Rangers are back at it in Saturday night with a game against the Canadiens at 7pm.

Rangers/’Canes Review

Did anyone else find that game a tad boring?

1)Man alive, for the first two periods of the game the players looked completely lethargic. The first goal against the Rangers was just a terrible BS goal. If Avery would have taken the body to Samsonov instead of trying to poke check him with his stick Hank would have had his second shutout of the season.

2) SHOOT DAMMIT! This isn’t criticism, but dammit Gaborik shoot the puck! Don’t try to go all finesse and slide it through his pads. Gabby could of had a trick last night if would have just shot the puck. But, this isn’t criticism as he is the best and most gifted player on the ice most nights.

3) Dubinsky’s goal was pretty. First he makes a great play to keep the puck in the zone and keep the play alive. Then Prospal with a great cross-ice pass to Gabby who shuffled it to Dubi who back-handed it over Ward and into the net.

4) Gaborik always seems to be in the right place at the right time, eh? That shot by Rozsival where he broke his stick and it hit the backboards and Dubinsky just flung it out in front of the net. The defenseman for the Hurricanes, I think it was Gleason, had the puck on his stick and Gaborik just stole the puck and put it away into the emptied net.

5) Hey Drury, Marc Staal can score from his own zone and you can only hit the post? Take some notes, eh?

6) Hank, as usual, stole the game once again. He didn’t have to make the spectacular saves like he did in Philly, but damn did he keep the team in the games or what? This is now eight of the last nine games where he has kept opponents to two goals or less.

Lundqvist Is Finding His Game

So, it looks as if Henrik Lundqvist has started to find his game, not that he ever really lost it. Even though he is 3-5 in his last eight games he has a Goals Against Average of 1.74 in those 7 games. That’s insane!! He has allowed two or less goals in 7 of his last 8 games. He has a save percentage of .944% in those games.

And it looks as if he will be starting the remainder of the games until the Christmas break.

Looking at his recent play, it looks as if our world class goalie has regained his ability.

Sangs Recalled

According to Andrew Gross,  Bobby Sanguinetti was recalled from Hartford today. The Rangers have three games in four nights, 2 against the Iles and 1 against Philly, so this provides them so leeway if someone gets injured.

One could only hope that Michal Roszival gets benched, or even better, sent down to Hartford. Hey, I can wish can’t I?

One other note, Chad “Don’t Call Me Ochocinco” Johnson will start tomorrow night against the Islanders in all likelihood, seeing as Hank has started 3 games in 5 nights. Lundqvist will be starting in goal tonight as per NY Newsday.

Henrik Lundqvist Will Decide Game 7

Henrik Lundqvist will decide game 7 of this series. If Henrik plays like he did in game 2 and 4 the Rangers can win the series, but if he plays like he did in games 1, 3, 5 and six the Rangers could have a hard time. The King has been pulled going into the third period going into the third period the last 2 games.

Ryan Callahan, Brandon Dubinsky, Staal and Girardi will hopefully have another good game. The Rangers big name players will have to step up. Players like Gomez, Drury, Naslund, Zherdev and Antropov will have to play well if they want to win.

Mike Green is not that good of a defenseman. He is basically a forward placed on defense. If you put Crosby or Malkin on defense they would have the same numbers as Green. Green shouldn’t be a Norris finalist.

Does anyone else think that Versus is idiotic. I don’t understand why the schedule two games on the same night? Then they only show the last little bit of the second game. It’s stupid, but we’ve come to expect that with Versus. It’s not about hockey, it’s not about the NHL it’s all about ratings. They could care less what people want. Versus is terrible.

Let’s hope they aren’t too biased tonight and I might actually be able to enjoy the game.